Jan 10, 2011

Barley Laddu – A Healthy Treat for a Happy Birthday

Yes, it’s a happy birthday to Trendy Relish (and also Essence of Andhra as it was previously called)!! It’s exactly been a year Trendy Relish was born and three years Essence of Andhra (Telugu Ruchi) was born. To be exactly clear: Trendy Relish came to life during the first week of January 2010 and Essence of Andhra has stepped into the wonderful world of blogging during the second week (around Pongal season) of January 2008. So I wanted to celebrate both birthdays in the middle that means today.

I am sooooo glad that I have decided to start my own blog in 2008. Or else how could I have made so many friends? Thank you so much dear friends, readers and visitors for keeping this little blog alive and for all the support you’ve been giving to my blog. Keep visiting and be encouraging!!

These days I’ve been trying to include many healthy ingredients (mostly I guess:)) as possible in my regular diet. I’ve been searching ways to make my kids also eat these healthy things. They always say, why all the healthy things taste so bad? So I thought why don’t we try to make these taste good for good health?

I wanted to celebrate the blog’s birthday with a healthy sweet treat which will make everyone craving for more. And it was a hit.

Coming to the recipe: I used Pearl Barley for making these laddus. These grains can be found in regular Grocery Stores. Pearl Barley is nothing but regular Barley where the hull and bran is removed by processing. This makes these grains cook faster and make them less chewy than the regular barley grains. They still possess all the health benefits as the regular barley.

If interested, all the health benefits of BARLEY can be read at this Site: WHFoods.

Ingredients: (Makes 16 small Laddus as in the picture)

1 cup Pearl Barley

1 cup Sugar

¼ cup Milk

2 tsp Ghee (Clarified Butter)

Few Cashews + Few Raisins

¼ tsp Cardamom Powder

Preparation:

Check barley and remove any impurities it may contain. Then heat a pan and dry roast barley until it turns golden brown in color. Keep aside to cool.

When barley becomes cold, grind it into a fine powder along with sugar. Filter and grind the remaining coarse grains again until they become fine.

Heat ghee in a pan and add cashews + raisins and sauté until the raisins bubble up and cashews turn golden brown in color.

Pour this over barley + sugar mixture and mix well. Then add cardamom powder + milk and mix well by hand.

Note: Add little more milk if the mixture is still dry.

Take small portions of the mixture and shape into balls of desired size. Place them on a plate to dry for some time.